Unlike the rowdy reveling in my native US, the New Year’s holiday in Japan is usually a solemn and sedate affair, spent quietly with family. Usually, schools and businesses allow a holiday of a few days.
My adult children had returned home from Kyoto and Tokyo, and we enjoyed an American holiday meal complete with roast chicken, mashed potatoes, lemon-flavored squash, and cranberry sauce. The next day, New Year’s Eve, we started in on the o-sechi ryori, the food traditionally eaten on January 1, and the following days. In the past, the woman of the house spent days preparing these special foods, each with a particular meaning. For example, fish eggs are meant to encourage fertility, and sweetened black beans signify good health. The food is beautifully arranged in lacquer boxes.
In our family, my Japanese husband has been in charge of the New Year’s cooking in recent years, sometimes with help from our children. This year, however, we opted to buy already-made o-sechi ryori. We gathered at the table and sampled the various delicacies, then watched a music competition show on TV — another traditional Japanese activity. All across Japan, many other families were doing the same.
According to the Chinese zodiac, 2024 is the year of the wood dragon. In dragon years, it is said that people can harness the creature’s powers to unleash creativity, passion, courage and confidence. It is thought to be the ideal time to achieve one’s dreams, a time of hope and opportunity.
The aftermath of Noto Peninsula Earthquake in Japan that struck on 1st January 2024
My family and I awoke on January 1st, feeling renewed and refreshed, ready to continue pursuing our dreams. However, our moods changed when an earthquake occurred that afternoon in Ishikawa Prefecture. TV broadcasts were interrupted by frantic voices telling those in the affected area to evacuate immediately and to take cover. All across Japan, we were reminded of the devastating earthquake and tsunami of the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011 which claimed nearly 20,000 souls (with many more remaining missing). I remembered, as well, being shaken awake in our fifth-floor apartment by the Great Hanshin Earthquake of January 17, 1995, during which 6,434 people were killed.
Although the loss of life in Ishikawa (still being tallied as I write this) has not been quite so severe, the devastation displayed on TV, in newspapers, and online is heartbreaking. We have heard of middle-aged parents who lost their two daughters who were home for the holidays, of thousands whose home were reduced to rubble, of hundreds of people in an evacuation center with only two toilets. The day after the initial earthquake, a Japan Airlines plane crashed into a smaller Coast Guard plane on the runway at Haneda airport. The latter was preparing to carry supplies to earthquake victims in Ishikawa. Again, my family was glued to the TV, unable to look away as the jet burned to the ground. We were relieved to learn that all crew and passengers escaped from the plane, but saddened by the deaths of five Coast Guard members who were seeking to help others.
Plane crash on January 2nd, 2024 in Tokyo
The foreign media often celebrates the resilience of the Japanese people: all those earthquakes and landslides and floods, and still they get on with their lives! However, Japan ranks only 54th on the 2022 Happiness Report, and suicide is the leading cause of death for men between the ages of 20-44 and women 15-34. The Japan Times reported in 2019 that according to a survey conducted by The Policy Institute and King’s College, London, only 24% of respondents in Japan agreed that “seeing a mental health professional is a sign of strength.”
Two of the first expressions that I learned when I first came to Japan were, “gaman wo suru” (“be patient”/ “endure”) and “shikata ga nai” (“it can’t be helped”). I came to understand that many Japanese have a sense of fatalism and helplessness, which might account for the general malaise in spite of Japan being a safe, peaceful, prosperous, orderly country with an excellent education system and exemplary healthcare.
During this past week, however, I have also been reflecting upon the changes wrought in response to disasters. After the 1995 earthquake in Kobe, schools stepped up their earthquake drills, and a disaster prevention center was established in our town. The school my daughter attended held a workshop on how to make dishes out of newspapers in the event of a disaster and began holding “disaster camps” simulating evacuation centers in the summer. Neighbourhood-wide disaster drills also increased, and signs were put up indicating sea levels and designated evacuation centers. Although it has been reported that evacuation centers in Ishikawa do not support those with disabilities, at least there is now an awareness of what needs to be changed.
Earthquakes and other natural disasters are unavoidable, but I admire the effort that the Japanese people put into mitigating their effects. My hope is that more and more people here will begin to understand that it is okay to cry, to mourn, to grieve, and to talk about our suffering. My wish for the Japanese people in the new year is happiness and the achievement of dreams.
Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
even in Kyoto
I long for Kyoto—
cuckoo!
--Matsuo Basho (1644-94)*
My story begins at Kyoto Station, where I alight after a three-hour bus ride. I am on my way to meet my friend Yoko for dinner in the Kitayama area, and a drink at the Kyoto Hotel Roku. She and I once worked together at the same university in Naruto, but now she is an associate professor at a small women’s college in Kyoto. I head underground, through the Porta shopping center, and get on a subway bound for Kokusaikan. In spite of the crowds up above, the train allows for elbow room, and I easily find a seat. Most of the passengers are glued to their phones, some are masked. My eyes flit to an advertisement for a display of kimono. After several stops, I get off at Kitayama and find Yoko waiting at the wicket. We have a spaghetti dinner at a nearby restaurant, and then hail a taxi via Didi, Japan’s answer to Uber.
The taxi takes us through an upscale residential area featuring traditional homes. Yoko tells me that we are near Bukkyo University, originally an institution of research for monks, but now a university grounded in Pure Land Buddhism offering degrees in a variety of subjects including English, nursing, and social welfare. We are also not too far from my favorite temple, Kinkakuji. One of the first novels that I read upon arriving in Japan was Yukio Mishima’s TheTemple of the Golden Pavilion, translated by Ivan Morris, about a deranged monk-in-training who set fire to the gilded temple and burned it down. Surprisingly, none of the visitors from abroad that I have taken to this temple had ever heard of this 1950 incident or the book.
The driver turns down a long driveway and drops us off at the hotel entrance. “Nice hotel!” he says.
I resist the urge to defend our extravagance, to say we are just here for a drink, and then the next day for lunch. I have been commissioned to write an article about the hotel, but I can’t afford to spend the night.
The Roku Kyoto, which opened in September of 2021 when Japan was off limits to foreign tourists, is one of eight of LXR luxury properties worldwide, and Hilton’s first in Kyoto. (Others include The Biltmore, Mayfair in the United Kingdom, and the Mango House in the Seychelles.) Along with a tranquil, storied setting (in the 16th century, it was a community for artists and artisans), the hotel offers bespoke experiences, such as a session of kintsugi with a local master of the craft, using cracked hotel pottery, and traditional papermaking using water from the Tenjin River, which runs through the hotel grounds. Guests can also opt for a New Year’s Eve package including a two-night stay, and a viewing of the sunrise over Mt. Fuji via private plane at a cost of \4,800,000. Nevertheless, the hotel strives to be a place where local residents can come for escape and enjoyment as well as high-flying tourists.
We are greeted warmly at the entrance and shown to the dimly lit bar. Walking along the basin at the center of the hotel complex, I take in the reflection of the full moon on the water. I feel like we should be writing haiku. The veranda would be the perfect setting for filming a period drama.
Resturant in TemujinEngawa: Non-tatami matted flooring Photos Provided by Suzanne Kamata
The day before, I had tried and failed to make a reservation, and assumed that the restaurant was fully booked. However, after verifying that we could drop in for a drink or a cup of coffee without notice, we decided to go ahead with our plans. As it turns out, we are the only ones in the bar at a little after eight.
A small lamp is placed on our table, and the bartender brings us a menu bound in leather. I had been planning on having the Hana-monogatari (flower story) cocktail made from seasonal herbs and flowers from the hotel garden, but the Pear Moscow Mule sounds irresistible. Yoko selects the Frozen Rum Chai, made with amazake (sweet sake). We also order a plate of chocolates.
Ambient music plays softly in the background as we catch up on gossip about former colleagues and update each other on current research projects. We speak softly in the hushed atmosphere which is broken only by the sound of a cocktail shaker behind the bar.
Our drinks arrive with paper straws. Mine has a slice of Asian pear hooked over the edge. The fruit changes by the season, I am told. I take a sip, taste a hint of lime with the kick of ginger: delicious.
“Mmmmm. This is so good,” Yoko says of her drink. We negotiate over the assorted chocolates, which are filled with raspberry and orange peels, among other things. Yoko lets me have the piece topped with gold.
Later, a couple more small groups enter the bar, but the area is spacious. Our privacy remains intact. We talk a bit more, finish our drinks, and agree about where to meet for lunch the next day.
Late the following morning, I take the same route from a bargain hotel near Kyoto Station, weaving between young women in yukata and a foreigner with brightly dyed, intricately braided hair, and get off at Kitayama. This time, as I emerge from underground, I take note of the electronic cuckoo sound chirping from a speaker, and I recall Basho’s famous poem about longing for Kyoto. Nearly 400 years after it was written, I imagine that the poem evokes the same emotion – a longing for the city in days of yore.
I have visited Kyoto many times since I first arrived in Japan. On the first, when I was just beginning to learn Japanese and still didn’t know quite what was going on, I spent the night at the residence where the previous Empress was trained in housekeeping, a rite of passage even for aristocratic girls. As I mentioned, I was partially motivated to come to Japan because of literature, namely the Heian court poetry that I learned about from a class in Asian history. I was enthralled with the idea of courtiers communicating via verse, and as a newly heartbroken nineteen-year-old, I identified with the intense longing in poems by Murasaki Shikibu and Ono no Komachi. Later, I read a novel set in Kyoto –Ransom, by Jay McInerney. What I remembered most about it was the funny Japlish phrases and scenes of karaoke, still a novelty in America in 1985. Flipping through it more recently, I came across this description of the Kamogawa (Duck River):
“From its source the river drained fields and paddies heavily fertilized with petrochemicals and manure. Closer in, the Kyoto silk dyers dumped their rinse tanks. The white herons that fished the shallows had purple plumage one day, green the next—weeks in advance of the women who brought the kimono silk in the shops downtown.”
Can this book really be what made me want to come to Japan? And yet, I also recall being attracted by the cuteness and kitsch, the Disney meets sci-fi vibe prevalent in Bubble Era Japan implied in, for example, Ridley Scott’s film Bladerunner. In any case, nostalgia sometimes leaves out the worst, and things seem to have changed for the better. As we cross the Kamogawa in another taxi, this time by daylight, I see no evidence of pollution.
“There are tons of ducks on the river,” Yoko says. “And ibises.”
“It’s famous.” I have come across many references to it in literature.
We arrive at the hotel a bit early for our noon lunch reservation, so we are shown to a large room with sofas and chairs, where we can drink tea or coffee while we wait. We choose to sit next to a window which looks out onto the basins. The blue sky, the changing leaves, and the still water create a calming tableau.
“I feel like my mind and brain are being purified,” Yoko says.
No other guests are around, and I wonder how many of the hotel’s 114 rooms are currently occupied. Perhaps everyone has already left the hotel for sightseeing.
A strip of moss runs parallel to the basin.
“It’s of better quality than the moss at Kokedera,” Yoko says, referring to another famous nearby temple renowned for its moss garden. “And you have to make a reservation a month in advance and pay \3,000 to visit!”
I write down her words, never having reflected upon the quality of moss before.
“You’d better write ‘as good as,’” she amends, suddenly aware of her sacrilege.
Finally, a gray-haired Japanese woman in a kimono emerges from the hotel and traverses the walkway between the two basins. A few minutes later, I see a Western woman with long brown hair pushing a baby in a stroller. And then a little later, a child wearing a fox mask, saunters across the walkway, slashing the air with a toy sword.
“He must have gone to Fushimi Inari Shrine,” Yoko says, referring to the popular tourist attraction known for its Instagram-worthy red torii gates.
Moss. Photo Provided by Suzanne Kamata
Just before twelve, we make our way to the restaurant, where we are shown to a table. The Japanese host/sommelier, suggests that we both sit on the same side, facing the window which provides a view of the fall foliage. He brings us the menu, and wine list.
I have already decided that I am having the wagyu burger. A glass of robust red wine would probably suit it best, but I am intrigued by the locally produced orange wine, which I’m told is comparable to a rose. Yoko asks the sommelier a lot of questions. Her partner works in wine in California, so she has visited many vineyards.
“It’s nice to talk to someone who knows so much about wine,” he says.
One of our two code-switching servers, both, as it turns out, from Nepal, pours a swallow of the orange wine into a glass for Yoko. She tastes it, but decides upon the sparkling plum wine, and the lunch course.
My image of plum wine comes from the syrupy homemade stuff we’d once received from my husband’s relative. “For when you have a cold,” she’d said. But this wine is something else – fruity, but light, and effervescent. Yoko asks where she can buy a bottle of it.
The sommelier explains that the hotel’s wines come from the nearby Tamba Winery, which is open to the public for tastings in the fall. It’s a short drive from where we are now. Their wines sell out quickly just in Kyoto and are mainly used by restaurants.
Yoko’s first course is pesto-dipped scallops submerged in vichyssoise made with white beans. She invites me to taste it. I dip my spoon into the shallow bowl. The bright green of the basil is a surprising delight. There is a bit of a crunch.
“What is that crunchy thing?” I ask our server. “And what kind of flower is that?”
“Just a moment,” he says, and ducks away to find out.
The answer: croutons, and linaria.
I am almost regretting that I didn’t choose the lunch course as well, but then my burger arrives, along with a generous serving of fries, and I am glad that I skipped breakfast. I probably won’t need dinner, either.
I’d imagined that all wagyu was from Kobe, but the host tells us that it’s Kyoto beef.
Yoko’s second course is marinated salmon with spinach, potatoes, onion, and amaranth flowers. The server spoons duck sauce around it.
“Is there a lot of duck cuisine in Kyoto?” I ask Yoko, my mind going to the Kamogawa.
“Yes,” she says, “But I don’t think the ducks are from the river.”
Lastly, we have dessert—a fig cradled in a chocolate shell, topped with a dollop of cassis ice cream. The plate is painted with sauces. It is exquisite to both eyes and tongue.
Before leaving the property, we stroll around the grounds taking in the lawn where morning yoga and meditation are held, the orange tree and lavender beside the thermal pool (the peels of the former are used in footbaths at the spa), the exercise room redolent with cedar and cypress with a vista of Takagamine Mountain.
As we prepare to leave, Yoko suggests that next time, we treat ourselves to a hot stone massage in the spa, followed by afternoon tea on the veranda overlooking the stream. We can come in the winter, when there is snow frosting the mountain, for a different view. Yoko says that she might come by bicycle, and I vow to wear sneakers, so that I can walk from the station. Instead of longing for the past, we look to the future.
*This translation is from Kyoto: A Literary Guide (Camphor Press, 2020), translated, collated, and edited by John Dougill, Paul Carty, Joe Cronin, Itsuyo Higashinaka, Michael Lambe, and David McCullough.
Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
I can still remember the address of my childhood home – the house number on North Shore Road in Spring Lake, Michigan, and the five digit zip code. Short, but sweet. Here in Japan, where I’ve lived for the past twenty three years, I’ve had four different addresses, each seemingly longer than the last. I can hardly remember how to write the location of my current domicile, let alone the complicated addresses of apartments past.
Given the chance to win a bag of rice or a free trip at my local supermarket lottery, I would rather pass than take up a pen. My hand starts to cramp as soon as I see a form to fill out. At the bank, in a doctor’s office, or when having to write in the corner of an envelope, I tend to recoil. It takes such a long time to jot down my address.
Written in the Japanese style, which dates back to the Meiji Period, my address starts out with the name of the prefecture, in this case, Tokushima, followed by the county name, the name of my town, the district, and eventually narrows down to a house number. The house numbers, however, are not in sequential order, but from oldest to newest. Our street, like most in Japan, doesn’t have a name.
Postal workers seem to be the only ones to whom addresses here have any meaning, and, to their credit, they generally get mail to the right place. When I first came to this country, however, I hardly ever got letters from my friends and relatives in America. My grandma, one of my most reliable correspondents, refused to write to me unless I sent her address labels. My address was simply too long for her to write. An editor once informed me that I had the most complicated address she’d ever seen in her life.
Cab drivers, on the other hand, can never find my house. I usually advise guests coming by taxi to get dropped off at the neighbourhood grocery store, and I go to meet them on foot. Not even satellites seem to be much help. Although most every year we are required to draw a detailed map from our children’s schools to our house to enable teachers to find us for the annual home visit, one teacher tried to find his way using his car navigation system. I watched for his car from the window as rain poured down outside. Finally, the phone rang. He was lost. He was near a shrine, he said. Could I come and get him? I dashed out with my umbrella and found him a few streets away.
For convenience, I had name cards printed up a few years ago. Now, when someone asks for my address, I simply hand over a card or, more often than not, my email address. It’s easy to remember and I can write it in six seconds.
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Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
When I first came to Japan, it seemed as if people were always wanting to dress me up in traditional Japanese clothing and take my picture. The kimonos were bright, with embroidered cranes and flowers, and long furisode sleeves. I was 22 or 23. I would soon learn that such garments were only meant for young women. After marriage, Japanese women typically wore kimono with short sleeves in shades of gray.
Years later, I remember going to an event at my daughter’s school in a tunic and cardigan of light blue. One of the younger Japanese mothers commented on my outlandish fashion choice. Apparently, in Japan, I was too old for pastels. Also, it is unseemly to stand out.
Women tend to stay behind the scenes in this country. In fact, the word for wife, okusan, means “interior person.” This brings to mind someone who hides out in the depths of the house. Normally wives are not mentioned. Men do things without them. I have no idea what the wife of the current prime minister looks like.
As I became older, I could feel myself fading. For many years, I was conscious of the colour of my clothes. Wanting to be taken seriously and respected, I opted for the dark and somber. But recently I am less concerned with what other people think. This, too, comes with age.
I discovered that there is a stereotype concerning women of certain vintage in Osaka. They wear loud clothing, including leopard print, and say whatever they like. I admire that attitude. I am also a fan of Yayoi Kusama, she of the red wigs and huge polka dot dresses. Why not be iconic? Why not be a little weird?
I recently came across a call for models for a project called “40 over 40.” An American photographer in Tokyo named Tia Haygood had decided to make older women visible, to let them feel glamorous and have a good time. I volunteered to be a subject.
We had a consultation via Zoom in which I answered questions about my preferences and personality. I showed her my closet, and we talked about what I would wear. The champagne sequined dress that I bought for dinner with my daughter at the Eiffel Tower? Yes! And the four-inch heeled leopard print shoes that I had bought to go with the dress? Yes! My African print dresses? Yes! Businesslike black blazer? No!
The photo session would be fun, but I also needed a professional headshot. The author photo that I had been using, which had been hastily taken by my impatient husband in our backyard, was fifteen years old. Whenever someone asked me for a photo for a conference programme or a website, I panicked. All I had were some unsatisfactory selfies.
I packed a suitcase with clothes for the photo shoot and flew up to Tokyo. I spent the night in a hotel, and then took three trains to get to the photo studio. By the time I arrived, I was hot and sweaty.
Nobue, the makeup artist, greeted me when I peeked in the door. She ushered me into the breeze of the fan. When I had sipped some water and cooled off, I sat in a chair in front of a mirror and had my face made up.
“Don’t worry,” she kept saying, as she added colour. “Trust me.”
I did.
Tia and I talked about books and people that we knew in common and about the photo project. In December, there would be an exhibition in Tokyo featuring photos of the forty subjects. It would be a celebration, and also a networking opportunity. I vowed to be there.
For the next two or three hours, she took many photos of me in different outfits and poses. Music pumped out of the speakers. She told jokes to get me to laugh. It was fun, and it felt a tad self-indulgent, but I loved it.
While I was in that studio, no one was judging me and I wasn’t invisible. I sparkled.
Suzanne Kamata being jazzed up. Photographs provided by Suzanne Kamata
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Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
I suppose it is politically incorrect to say that I was somewhat under the influence of the movie, Out of Africa (1985), which featured European expatriates living the colonial life on a coffee plantation, or that my do-gooder impulse had been activated by other films such as Cry Freedom (1987) with Biko in it. I had decided that after I graduated from college, I would join the Peace Corps as a volunteer.
I had wanted to be a writer since I was a little girl growing up in Michigan. I have especially always wanted to write fiction. However, by the time I became a student of English literature in college, I realised that it would be difficult to make a living as a novelist. My plan upon graduation was to travel the world through teaching English as a foreign language. In this way, I would accumulate life experiences which would become fodder for my stories and novels.
Earlier, as a junior, I had spent a semester in Avignon, France, on foreign study, somewhat following in the footsteps of my older brother, who’d spent a year in Germany while we were in high school. I’d been inspired by his letters telling of his adventures abroad, sleeping on Spanish beaches, skiing down Austrian slopes. When he came back home, I saw how living abroad could transform a person. I wanted that for myself.
The interview for the Peace Corps was gruelling – a four-hour grilling, sometimes quite personal. They asked me if I had a boyfriend. I winced, because I had recently broken up with someone I thought I wanted to marry. “No,” I said. They told me that the most common reason for leaving a Peace Corps posting early was a boyfriend or girlfriend back home.
In the meantime, my brother, who’d majored in business, and who was concerned that I would be working for free, sent me a newspaper clipping about something called the JET Program, a fledging one-year scheme for “native speakers of English” to work as assistant language teachers in Japanese public schools. The position came with a salary that was decent at the time. I applied to that, too, as a back-up, in case the Peace Corps didn’t want me.
To be sure, I had an interest in Japan. At t the time, its economy was thriving and Japanese companies were buying up iconic American buildings. It seemed as if Japan was about to take over the world, and that it would behoove me to know something about the country. Also, I had taken a course in Asian history, and developed an interest in Heian Court poetry. I loved the idea of a country where people had communicated by passing poems to one another. And I was intrigued by the futuristic images depicted in the movie, Blade Runner (1982) the kitschy aspects rendered in Jay McInerney’s novel, Ransom (1985).
Anyway, I was accepted into the Peace Corps and told that I would be sent to Cameroon. After some consideration, I decided that I would go to Japan for one year, and then enter into a two-and-half stint in the Peace Corps. But then once I arrived in Japan, I found that I wanted to stay a little bit longer. Just one more year. There was still so much to learn, so much to explore. I hadn’t yet climbed Mt. Fuji! I hadn’t been to Okinawa! I renewed my contract. In my second year, I fell in love with a Japanese high school teacher. And, yes, dear reader, I married him. I stayed in Japan and started a family. I have never been to Africa.
As I write this, I have been living in Japan for well over half of my life. From time to time, I wonder how my life might have turned out differently if I had gone to Cameroon as originally planned. Would I be working for an NGO in Africa? Or what if I had gone back to the United States after one or two years? Would I be living somewhere in suburbia, working nine to five at a company?
However, I also often consider what Japan has given me. Living outside my country has opened my mind, and has given me countless opportunities, including fodder for the stories that I write. And thanks to my writing, I am now employed at a small university where we have many students from around the world. I continue to nourish my heart and mind by reading literature and watching films from and about other cultures.
I find that we are not so different after all.
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Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
Community weed-pulling is one of the things that produces anxiety in me. At times like this, when we are summoned to the shrine on a Sunday morning, I miss my Japanese mother-in-law. You only have to send one person from your household, and for as long as we lived with her, she was the one to go.
Sometimes my husband takes part, but on this particular weekend – well, most weekends – he was playing golf. (He is the three-time overall champion at his golf club.)
I am an insomniac and an introvert. The evening before, I was thinking about how I would sleep in the next morning, and then I would make a pot of coffee and continue reading this wonderful novel that I had been immersed in.
“Tomorrow is weed-pulling at the shrine,” my husband said. “Sorry. You’ll have to go.”
I must admit that I did not always look at the memos attached to the clipboard circulated in the neighbourhood. (No, we did not have a Facebook group or use What’s App.) The groundskeeping had probably been mentioned, and I had ignored it.
Most of our neighbours are farmers, growing carrots, rice, and smaller amounts of other vegetables such as corn. Many families have lived here for generations, and know each other from helping out at harvest time. My husband and I are educators – him at a nearby high school, me at a teacher’s college. We moved into this neighbourhood to look after my mother-in-law, who has now passed on. I don’t really know most of the people who live in the houses nearby.
The neighbours probably know more about me than I know about them. Before she went, my mother-in-law suffered from mental illness. Her delusions included stories about me – my alleged affairs, my theft of her dishes and other things – which she shared with the neighbours. I always wonder if these rumours come to mind when the farmers look at me. Like, not only is there a foreigner in their midst, but do they also think I’m some kind of Jezebel?
My husband said that weed-pulling would be from eight thirty to nine o’clock. Before leaving very early for golf at his fancy club in the mountains, he laid out a cloth hat with a back flap to keep the sun off my neck, a pair of guntei – white cotton gloves sold in packs and used for all manner of outdoor chores – sleeves for protecting my arms from the sun, and some money – annual “dues” for the neighbourhood committee. He didn’t prepare a gardening tool for me.
I got dressed, had a cup of coffee, and fed the cats. I wondered whether I should carry a mask. Probably, yes. Although the government had put out a statement weeks earlier that pandemic protocols need no longer be followed, and the local newspaper had stopped posting the daily number of COVID-19 cases (which here, in Tokushima, had been zero for weeks at a time), most people still wore those white paper masks. They wore masks while outdoors, washing a car, alone; while driving alone; while shopping; while out walking for exercise. I had pretty much stopped wearing a mask, unless someone asked me to, like while visiting the buffet at a work-related party, but on this occasion, I figured I had better put one on.
I recalled how early in the pandemic, someone in our neighbourhood had returned from a cruise on the Diamond Princess and tested positive for the coronavirus. That person had been pelted with carrots. A window was broken in their home. They’d had to move away, at least until the furore died down. I recalled how our son had been stranded in South Carolina for months, after being kicked off campus during studies abroad. My sister-in-law had sent urgent messages wondering when he would leave her house. Meanwhile, my husband forbade him from returning to our home in Japan. What if he caught the virus en route? We would become pariahs. These neighbours would torment us, too.
I put on the hat, but since I was wearing a long-sleeved red shirt, I didn’t wear the sleeves. When I arrived at the grounds of the wooden shrine, raking and weed-pulling was already underway. Of course, everyone was wearing a mask. Women in aprons and hats similar to mine squatted on the ground, hacking at weed sprouts with small scythes. I realised that I should have brought a tool. A man sitting on the shrine steps was collecting money. I waited while he wrote out a receipt, after which he handed me a plastic bag containing coloured garbage bags (orange for plastics, pink for combustibles) and a bottle of Pocari Sweat.
I decided to take the swag back home and get a tool. Our house is only a few yards from the shrine; it would only take a minute. I thought about not going back; they probably wouldn’t really miss me. But they would notice I had been there and gone, me with my red shirt. Duty prevailed. I found a trowel in the shed and returned. I found a spot.
I’m probably doing this wrong, I thought, as I loosened the soil with my trowel and tugged at weeds. The woman nearest me — a farmer, no doubt – was pulling briskly with both hands. She wasn’t using a tool. Huh. I never did things “correctly” in Japan. There was the time when I was called out for eating curry and rice with a fork instead of a spoon. There was the time when I was helping serve lunch at my daughter’s kindergarten and I was chastised for heaping the rice too high in the rice bowl – as one would prepare a bowl of rice for the dead.
Then, an ambulance appeared. Apparently, in those few minutes when I had been gone, retrieving my gardening tool, someone had fainted or otherwise felt poorly. I looked around and saw an elderly man lying on the shrine steps. He was wearing a mask. I wondered if he had felt faint because he was exerting himself on a warm morning while wearing that mask. I wondered why he didn’t take it off. He lay completely still. From where I crouched, he resembled a corpse with a white handkerchief over his face.
I heard someone say that the man was alright, and he didn’t need to go to the hospital. The ambulance attendants dragged a gurney over anyway and took a look at him. They lingered for a while, then left. The man remained prone on the shrine steps, completely still, the white mask on his face.
The other women seemed to have no problem crouching and pulling, but I had to stand up from time to time to stretch my legs. My cotton-gloved fingers scrabbled at dried leaves and uprooted weeds, which I shook the dirt from and tossed into a net. I kept glancing at my watch. Nine o’clock came and went.
Finally, someone approached and announced that weed-pulling was over. I helped another woman carry the net to a flat-bed truck heaped with leaves. I arched my back, happy to stand up straight, and edged toward the periphery of the group, where a few younger women stood. I was done. I could go back to my book and my coffee.
“From now, we will have disaster training,” a man announced.
Oh, no. This could go on all day.
“Are you going to stay?” one of the younger women asked me.
It occurred to me that I could set an example – maybe not a good one, in the eyes of the neighbourhood committee, but I could give these women the courage to leave. I sensed they were outliers like me. We could be rebels together.
“No,” I said. “I’m escaping.”
They giggled and followed me away from the shrine.
Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
When my twenty-three-year-old daughter Lilia, who is deaf, sent me a text saying that she wanted to attend the Osaka Comic Convention, I messaged back “Go ahead!” I figured she would want to go with her friends, fellow manga and anime and Marvel movie enthusiasts. I am more of a literary-novel-type person, unfamiliar with the DC universe. My idea of a good time is reading a book of poetry with a cat on my lap. However, a week or so later, she repeated her desire, along with a GIF of a crying cat, fountains of tears gushing from its eyes. This was followed by three attempted video phone calls while I was at work.
“Do you want me to go with you?” I texted.
“Yes,” she replied.
Well, I could do this for her. On our mother-daughter trip to Paris several years back, she had put up with my dragging her (okay, pushing; she is a wheelchair user) to the Orsay Museum, even though she would have rather gone to the Concierge to look at a lock of Marie Antoinette’s hair. She had made concessions for me, so I could make some for her. Besides, I had never been to a comic convention before. It might be fun. At the very least, I could write about it.
I put her in charge of buying the tickets from the Japanese website. She sent me a screen shot: 25,000 per ticket. What? “That’s really expensive,” I texted her. “I’ll pay for it,” she texted back.
I later found out that admission was only 3,610 yen. The extravagant fees were for a photo opportunity with one of the celebrities who would be headlining the event. One of them played the role of Lilia’s favourite character in her favourite TV series. She had watched all ten episodes of all thirteen seasons, and regularly posted related fan art on her Instagram feed. She had purchased the chance to be in close proximity to the actor.
Sure, it was expensive, but research has shown that experiences are often ultimately more satisfying than things. I know that to be true myself. In Paris, we had a never-to-be-forgotten dinner at the top of the Eiffel Tower. When we went to Hawaii, on our last trip together pre-pandemic, we had gone on an open-door helicopter ride. For Lilia, having her photo taken with the celebrity would probably be just as thrilling. She had also bought a ticket for me.
I didn’t know much about the celebrity. In fact, I knew nothing. I had glimpsed him onscreen, occasionally, when Lilia was bingeing episodes of the show on our widescreen TV. I looked him up on Wikipedia. He had an impressive background. He’d started out in politics, had probably met President Obama, and then transitioned into entertainment. He had kids, whom he was concerned about feeding well. His wife was a university professor, like me, and he’d published a book of poetry, which I immediately ordered.
I started thinking about how I could make the most of this opportunity. As the author of several novels published by small presses, I was always looking for ways to promote my books. I knew that a celebrity endorsement – or even having a famous person be photographed while holding one’s novel – could bring attention to a book. Maybe I could get the celebrity to hold my book during the photo-op, and then I could post it on Instagram.
But then I went to the website for the Comic Con. I came across a notice that one of the celebrities who had been scheduled to appear in Tokyo in 2022, would not be coming after all. The message read, “Due to a last-minute personal issue,” the celebrity “is unable to travel and had to postpone his appearance at this year’s Tokyo Comic Con. He was looking forward to coming back to Japan and seeing everyone. He is deeply sorry and looks forward to coming back to Japan next year.” But the actor was not attending this year either. He had been run over by a snow plow a few months before and was still in recovery. (This was not mentioned on the website.)
Elsewhere on the website, I came across a list of exhibitors, food vendors, celebrity guests (seven men, one woman), and rules regarding the autograph and photo sessions. So many rules! We would not be allowed to hug the celebrities or touch them at all. We would not be allowed to take selfies or other photos with our own smartphones, or bring props (like a book?), or wear masks, or give gifts to the celebrities. Okay, so maybe I wouldn’t be able to ask the TV star to hold my book.
Since the Comic Convention started relatively early, Lilia and I stayed overnight at a nice hotel in Osaka. The next morning, I put on make-up and a pretty dress. I helped Lilia with her hair. We went down to the dining room for a gorgeous buffet breakfast – made-to-order omelettes, tiny French pastries, a big bowl of fresh lychee fruits, and other delights. Although I had splurged on accommodations, I thought that we would take public transportation to the convention site to save money. But that morning, on the third day of the event, the day of our scheduled photo op, rain poured down. We had forgotten to bring waterproof ponchos and umbrellas. I decided we’d go by taxi.
We hopped into a cab at the hotel. The driver was surprised when I mentioned the destination. “We’ll have to go by highway,” he said. That would mean toll fees. But at least we would get there on time, and we would be relatively dry.
The venue, Intex Osaka, was over a bridge on a small island with lots of boxy warehouses. At first, I was amazed by the lack of cars. And people. Were we even in the right place? I didn’t have enough cash on me for a taxi ride back to Osaka Station, and this driver didn’t appear to take credit cards. At last, we reached the huge convention center.
“This is it!” the driver said. Still, no people. He continued to drive around the building, rain spattering his windshield, until, to my relief, we came across some men in uniform waving orange batons, and then to the front, where a long stream of young people holding umbrellas flowed toward the entrance.
Once inside, Lilia flashed our tickets. After a cursory bag check, red paper Comic Con bracelets were fastened to our wrists. I grabbed a map, and tried to get my bearings, but Lilia whipped out her tablet, wrote something on it in Japanese, and showed it to one of the many attendants, a young man wearing a white surgical mask. She’d asked, “Where do we go for the celebrity photos?”
“I’ll show you,” the attendant said. “Follow me.” We scurried past cosplayers dressed up like Spiderman and the Joker and one woman dressed in green carrying a huge candy cane. Some people, not in costume were slurping noodles at a table near a food booth.
Cosplayers. Courtesy: Suzanne Kamata
The attendant indicated an area at the back of the building. We still had a couple of hours before our photo session. “So, we just come here at one fifteen?” I asked. We had an appointment, after all.
“You should get here early,” he said. “At least an hour before.”
I nodded. “Now, where is the Celebrity Stage?”
According to the program, another actor, famous to this crowd, at least, for his role in a movie based on an American comic book, would be participating in a Q and A session onstage in another twenty minutes. I figured we had plenty of time to find a good spot, but when we entered the enormous hall, I saw that all of the seats were filled. We were late.
“This way,” another attendant said, lifting the chain to the wheelchair-accessible area, just to the left of the stage.
We had a good view, but I couldn’t help thinking that at such an event in my native country, the United States, there would probably be a sign language interpreter. In Japan, there was almost never one, unless it was requested in advance. I did my best to interpret for my daughter.
In the program, the celebrity was pictured as bald and sleek. With his dark glasses, he appeared to be the epitome of cool. The man who ambled onto the stage, however, looked a bit scruffy, as off-duty actors often do. He had a beard, glasses, and a leather newsboy cap over his frizzy grey hair. One of his teeth was missing. He greeted the crowd in Japanese and was met with applause.
The emcee tried to engage him in conversation, but he was hard to pin down. He wandered around the stage, joking around. When asked a fan’s earnest question, “What special thing did you have to do to prepare for your role in the film?” he replied, “Nothing.” Later, he was asked if he would appear in another superhero movie. He rubbed his fingers together to indicate it would depend on how much money he was offered, and then, to demonstrate how little most actors actually earn, he took out a one-thousand-yen bill and ripped a tiny corner off. I imagined the horror of all of the frugal, hard-working people in the audience who would never do such a thing. The emcee gently admonished him for tearing money.
Finally, in true Japanese fashion, the emcee asked him to deliver a “special message” to his fans. The celebrity avoided responding to the request, at first, hopping off the stage, and peering into the camera, pretending to check his teeth. Again, “A message for your fans, please?” He got back onstage and adjusted the interpreter’s mic, before, at last, delivering his “message,” one Japanese word: “Hai.”
In this country where everyone was always so orderly and polite, I couldn’t help but be a bit embarrassed by his behaviour. I mean, I wouldn’t have shown up to a writer’s festival or an academic conference without thinking about what I would say. Then again, maybe his performance – and he was performing – was better than him sitting calmly in the chair, giving straight answers. Maybe the unpredictability of this mad genius was entertaining. Maybe just seeing this man who had brought beloved characters to life onscreen, live and in-person, and to be able to pay homage to him, was enough for his fans.
At about 12:10, after we had checked out the exhibitors’ tables and a display of manga posters, I suggested that we get in line for the photo session. Lilia eagerly rolled herself back to the spot we’d been shown to upon arrival. This time, we were early. Not only that, we were first in line. As we waited, Lilia composed a message to the celebrity on her smartphone. I figured that since she was deaf, the convention organisers would allow her to use her phone as a communication device.
A young woman in an orange kimono filed in behind us. More and more people followed. There were other cordoned-off rows for the other celebrities who would be signing autographs and posing for photos, including a Norwegian actor who was known for his role as a cannibal.
When we got closer to the appointment time, an attendant led us to another room, cordoned off like the immigration area of an international airport. Because my daughter uses a wheelchair, we got to take a shortcut. We were still at the head of the line. We were told to put all of our possessions into baskets – again, like the security line at the airport.
“My daughter is deaf,” I explained. “Is it okay if she hangs on to her phone? She just wants to show a few words to the celebrity.”
The attendant shook his head. “Talking to the celebrity is NG.” No good. Prohibited.
Regretfully, I explained what he’d said to my daughter. Lilia, who had also read all the rules on the website, was nonplussed. She put her phone away without complaint.
We stood there, waiting. Although I had the addict’s urge to check my email and scroll through social media, I left my phone in my bag. But I did reach for a notebook and pen.
“What are you doing?” my daughter asked.
“I’m just going to make a few notes,” I told her. “I might write an essay about this.”
“No, you can’t write an essay.” She made an “X” with her arms. No selfies, no touching the celebrity, no talking to the celebrity, and probably no writing about the celebrity.
“I think it’s okay to write an essay,” I said. I scribbled a few words then put the notebook and pen back into my bag.
I asked the attendant where the nearest subway or train station was, already thinking about how we would get home. My daughter asked me what we were talking about and then became irritated. I understood that she wanted me to focus on the celebrity, to think only about him, and what would happen when he arrived. I tried.
More and more people, mostly Japanese women, lined up behind us. I began to realise why the organisers didn’t allow conversation. If the celebrity had to engage in small talk with a hundred or more people, he would become exhausted. As it was, he’d have to smile non-stop for an hour or so. His cheeks would ache. But he would probably make a lot of money from doing this. I wondered how much of a cut he would actually get from the photo-op fees. I thought about all the times I had sat at a table in a bookstore or at a book festival, hoping to sell my novels, and no one had come. Yes, I envied the celebrity.
We waited and waited. The celebrity was late to the photo op. He was probably still signing autographs. Finally, we were led, just a few of us, including the young woman in the orange kimono, into a tented area with a backdrop. A photographer and team stood at the ready. My daughter began to tremble. She indicated that her heart was pounding: doki doki. I thought she was going to hyperventilate. We waited some more.
I wondered if this guy would be scruffy and irreverent like the actor onstage. I hoped not, for my daughter’s sake. We had been planning to have our photo taken together, the three of us, but at the last minute, Lilia changed her mind. She wanted to be in the photo alone with the celebrity. Fine with me.
“He’s coming soon,” someone said. “Please be patient.”
And then…at last…he entered the tent. He was dressed nicely in a blue collared shirt and black pants, a bit of stubble peppering his handsome, now familiar face, his hair neatly groomed.
Lilia’s hands flew to her flaming cheeks. She let out a squeal. The celebrity, and everyone else, were amused by her extreme excitement. He smiled at her as she pulled up next to him in her wheelchair. A piece of tape served as a divider: fan on one side, celebrity on the other. He stood there towering over her, with his aura of fame.
And then, Lilia’s favourite actor, the man who brought her most beloved fictional character to life, crouched down so that their heads were at the same level. He put his arm firmly around her shoulders. The woman behind me, no doubt as aware of the “no touching” rule as I was, gasped. The photographer clicked the shutter, and just like that, it was over. Lilia wheeled out of the way.
Next was my turn. I stepped up to the screen. The celebrity put his arm around me, and I smiled for the camera. “Thank you,” I said in a low voice and exited the tent.
By the time we gathered our belongings, the photos were already printed and ready to be picked up. In the first one, Lilia and the celebrity grinned widely. She held both thumbs up. His body leaned toward hers. They both looked cute. In the second photo, my hands hung down, my posture was stiff, the celebrity’s smile was a tad dimmer, and…my eyes were closed.
But it was okay. The celebrity would probably never see this unflattering, awkward version of me, or the hundreds of other photos taken at this and other Comic Cons. And at least I got an essay out of it. For my daughter, though, this has been the thrill of a lifetime — expensive, yes, but more precious than gold!
A cosplayer holding Suzanne Kamata’s TheBaseball Widow. Courtesy: Suzanne Kamata
Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
In her heyday, my mother was a full-time homemaker, and an excellent cook and baker. She managed to have lunch and dinner on the table at the exact time every day, and there was always a homemade dessert. She followed recipes closely, something that I also have a tendency to do, which irritates my freewheeling husband. Mom had a box crammed with recipes handwritten on three by five cards, and a shelf of cookbooks, many of which were community compilations filled with recipes by the members of various churches she and my grandmother had attended. Occasionally, she made alterations which became notations in the margins: “Only half a teaspoon of sugar.” “Omit garlic.”
Several years ago, my mother, now in her eighties, lost her ability to follow a recipe. Although she can handle making a sandwich or opening and heating a can of mixed vegetables, she no longer makes meals. That task has fallen mainly to my father, but on my annual trips home from Japan, where I now live, I try to help out. On my most recent visit, I made a meat loaf using the recipe that my mother used exclusively, which calls for evaporated milk, chopped onions and peppers; Japanese-style curry and rice; and macaroni and cheese. I asked my dad what else he might have a craving for. He said “chop suey.”
When I was a kid in 1970s Michigan, chop suey was one of my favorite dishes, but I hadn’t had it in ages. Last I recall, Mom had made it when my Japanese husband had accompanied me on a visit. Her version called for chunks of pork, bean sprouts, and celery with some kind of sauce. This mixture was layered over rice and topped with crunchy chow mein noodles. I knew that it wasn’t authentic Asian cuisine, that it was more of an interpretation for Americans. But the dish still conjures memories of my childhood, those days of riding bikes and climbing trees until dusk, of no homework, and ‘Gilligan’s Island’ and ‘I Dream of Jeannie’ on our black and white TV.
“Okay,” I told my dad. “I’ll make it.” I turned to my mother and asked her where the recipe was. Although she can’t cook, she remembers in exactly which cookbook certain recipes are located. But this time she said, “There’s no recipe. It’s in my head.” But she couldn’t tell me how to make it.
I turned to the internet and learned that chop suey had been all the rage in the 1950s, and that every American housewife had had her own way of making it. Some used chicken, some added snow peas and baby corn, but I remember my mother’s as being totally brown. She had never added anything green or any other color. The sauces were slightly different, too, calling for oyster sauce in one case, soy with dark molasses in another.
I went back to my mother’s cookbooks to see what I could find. Finally, I came across a recipe in a community cookbook produced by a Methodist women’s group at the church we had attended in Grand Haven, Michigan, when I was a child, before we moved to South Carolina. It was annotated in blue ink: “See p. 78 Good Housekeeping Cookbook.” I couldn’t find the volume in question.
“Maybe you don’t have it any more,” I told my dad.
He shook his head. “It’s there somewhere. She never threw anything away.”
I looked again. Nothing. Even so, the recipe I’d found seemed pretty close to what I recalled. I made a shopping list and headed to Walmart.
The grocery section at the local Walmart had a modern selection of Indian curries and Japanese Pocky sticks and Thai noodles, but I couldn’t find canned bean sprouts or those crunchy chow mein noodles. Was it due to a supply chain issue? Or maybe no one produced those ingredients anymore. Maybe, along with chipped beef on toast, chop suey was a relic of the past. Disheartened, I scoured the rows of raw vegetables; still, no luck.
As a last resort, I made a stop at Food Lion, which also had an international foods isle, heavy on the Mexican. Lo and behold, they stocked a few cans of bean sprouts and a bag or two of those crunchy La Choy noodles from my past!
Back home, after sleuthing around the shelf a bit more, I came across a thick old cookbook which had lost its cover. It turned out to be the Good Housekeeping Cookbook. Some of the pages had fallen out, and been tucked back in. I immediately turned to page 78 and found a recipe for “California Chop Suey” with further annotations.
My South Carolina version was a combination of the one found in the Methodist church community cookbook and the Good Housekeeping version. I had substituted fresh chopped celery and onions, and a can each of mushrooms, beans sprouts and water chestnuts, for the “canned oriental vegetables.”
Due to a variety of dietary restrictions, real or imagined, my mother declined to partake. She did peer into the pot and declare my concoction watery, but I didn’t want to add more cornstarch. I hefted the pot onto the table, along with the rice I’d cooked, and a bag of those crispy chow mein noodles. My dad had made salads.
We heaped our plates with rice, then ladled chop suey on top. Lastly, we sprinkled some of those chow mein noodles over the mounds.
Dad dug in with a spoon. “Mmmm! Good!”
I thought it had turned out pretty well, too. Maybe that chop suey wasn’t authentically Chinese, or any other Asian country’s dish, but it hinted at a flavour that resonated more deeply. My tongue recognised that chop suey as the taste of Mom.
Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
When I returned to the university where I teach at the beginning of the year – the Year of the Rabbit in Japan — my Canadian colleague and I greeted each other.
“How was your winter break?” he asked me.
“Wonderful!” I told him about how both of my children, who have finished school and left home, returned for the holidays. We’d enjoyed feasting on traditional foods and lazing in front of the TV. “And yours?”
He rolled his eyes. “My son is studying for his high school entrance exam,” he told me. “It was so-o-o stressful.”
How well I remember those days! I think of the year that my own son faced that all-important test, the one that would supposedly determine his entire future, predicting what college he would enter, and then what kind of job, as the Year of the Tiger Papa.
You have probably heard of “tiger mothers” or “education mamas,” stereotypical Asian moms who push their children to succeed academically. Although after having lived in Japan for 23 years at that point I felt that I almost qualified as an Asian mother, no one had ever called me by either of those names. Of course, I wanted my children to do well in school. I was a good student myself, and I was well aware of the value of a good education. However, during PTA meetings, when other mothers were begging the homeroom teacher to assign more homework, mine was the lone voice lobbying for more recess.
Then, my son became a third-year junior high school student. I’d heard that in Japan everything gets put on hold while the kid in question prepares for the all-important high school entrance exam. Since I didn’t have to take an exam to get into my American high school, I really had no idea of the preparation involved. I deferred to my Japanese husband, whom I began to refer to as Tiger Papa.
During the long school holiday, I proposed a family trip to the United States.
“No, “ Tiger Papa said. “Our boy needs to study.”
“Can’t he study while he’s on vacation?” I asked.
Tiger Papa was doubtful. “He needs to study for ten hours a day. Plus, there’s cram school.”
“Well, okay.”
There are many debates about how many hours kids should study, and which country has the best educational system, but we live in Japan. For our kids, success in school meant doing well in the Japanese school system. If our son was willing to study ten hours a day to get into the high school of his choice, then I wasn’t going to stand in his way.
During the end of the year cleaning, my husband and daughter and I washed the windows and polished the floors while our son was holed up in his room with his books. He didn’t have time to hang out with his friends, but he was exempt from all chores. Occasionally, I would bring a cup of hot chocolate to his room.
On the morning of his entrance exam, he sharpened his pencils, strapped on a watch, and rode his bike to the high school where he sat for a five-hour exam. When he came home, he smiled for what seemed the first time in weeks. Come what may, his year of studying was over. I made his favourite soup to celebrate.
“It’s your turn to do the dishes,” Tiger Papa said afterwards. “And then you can clean your room.”
(And yes, dear reader, he got into the school of his choice.)
Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
But one day, my husband said, “How about a cat?” His high school friend, who was a veterinarian, had an American long-haired kitten to give away. His children had found it abandoned by the side of the road, scared and shivering, and brought it home. It was black – an unpopular colour due to its bad luck connotations. The colour of a witch’s familiar.
“Yes!” my son, now fifteen, said. By this time, he would have been happy with a hedgehog or a salamander – any pet at all.
Although I love cats, I was more reluctant. After all, I’d just bought a brand-new sofa and love seat with some book money I’d gotten. I could just imagine what a cat’s claws would due to those leather cushions.
Nevertheless, my husband and son set out for the vet’s office. They came home later with the kitten cuddled against my son’s chest and all the accoutrements – food dish, cat toys, scratching post, and a multi-tiered tower that my husband immediately assembled.
From the beginning, like a duckling that imprints on the first thing that it sees, the kitten, which we named Sumi (the Japanese word for the black ink used in traditional calligraphy) liked my son the best. My early rising husband may have been the one to fill his food dish every morning, and my daughter sometimes coaxed him into her room for sleeping, but my son was his favourite. Sumi would leap from my lap to greet him at the door when he returned from school, and mew plaintively and persistently at his bedroom door until he was admitted. Sumi was skittish and inclined to hiss at strangers. He’d run away and hide under a bed when my sister-in-law dropped by for a visit. But he crooned a greeting when my son walked into the room. They bumped their heads together with mutual affection.
Of course, I grew to love Sumi as well even though, predictably, he clawed the new sofa, scratched the wallpaper, and regurgitated his food on our freshly installed tatami mats.
My husband tried to discipline Sumi, sometimes by holding him immobile and roaring at him, but instead of becoming docile and obedient, Sumi began avoiding him or hissing in his presence. My husband began to grumble that a dog would have been better.
One afternoon, a couple of years later, my son came home with another kitten. She was a tiny, mewling thing with blue eyes and white fur, with a smudge of black on her face – a Siamese, by the looks of her.
“She followed me,” my son said. He’d been down by the riverbank, pitching a baseball against a brick wall, when the tiny creature had found him. “I couldn’t just leave her there.”
Apparently, she’d been recently abandoned, her trust and innocence still intact. She wasn’t skittish and shy like Sumi. She was adorable, but we all knew that Sumi wouldn’t welcome her, and one cat was really enough. How much more violence could our sofa and wallpaper endure? Besides, my son, a sophomore in high school, was taking off the very next day for a four-day school trip to Tokyo. Who would deal with the kitten?
However, she quickly grew on us humans (though Sumi, now quite large, was terrified of the little ball of fur). We ended up keeping her, and she quickly adapted, co-opting the litter box, happily eating kibble – and tomatoes! And broccoli! — from the same dish as Sumi and hopping up onto the nearest warm lap. My daughter named her “Mii.” But she, too, had a special relationship with my son, her saviour. He taught her to fetch – like a dog! And she came when he called her, like a dog.
We tried to keep her safely indoors. But one day, she managed to escape. Hours later, she turned up, limping. We took her to the vet, who said that she had gotten into a fight. He gave her some antibiotics. For a couple days, she lost interest in going outdoors.
But a week later, she got out again! This time she was gone overnight, I searched all over the neighbourhood, calling her name, but she didn’t come.
That evening, rain started to fall. Suddenly, we heard her distinctive mewling. My son grabbed a flashlight and we went in the direction of her voice. We found her stranded on the tile roof of a nearby house and pounded desperately on the door. Finally, it creaked open to reveal an elderly woman in her nightclothes. I wonder what she thought, seeing two foreign-looking strangers on that rainy dark night.
“Our cat’s on your roof,” my son explained. “Can we go into your yard?”
The woman kindly provided us with a ladder, and we got the kitten down.
As my son began his last year of high school and began thinking about applying to universities in distant cities, we couldn’t help but think about the cats. They’d be so lonely without our boy.
“You should take Sumi with you,” my husband joked, as if any student apartment would allow such a pet. As if a cat would be happy confined to a tiny college dorm.
When he was accepted into a university in the far north of Honshu, in a city without a direct flight to our own, my husband ordered our son to get rid of all the stuff he didn’t need.
“You’ll be gone for good,” he said, “and we don’t want to have to deal with all of your junk.”
I knew that my husband’s gruffness was a front meant to conceal his sadness at our son’s departure. Our daughter would be leaving, too. Our nest would be empty. He was gearing himself up for grief.
“We’ll take Sumi off somewhere and dump him,” my husband said darkly. Sumi glared at him from underneath the table as if he’d understood, but I knew that the threat was empty. The cats would stay. They would keep us company after our children had left.
Already I was imagining the anxious queries from the north about Sumi and Mii, the photos that I would send by smartphone, the joyous meows at the beginning of university breaks.
“We have to keep the cats,” I told my husband, “so that our son will come back.”
Suzanne Kamatawas born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.
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